Lunar Ronin

Raph Koster, lead developer of Ultima Online, Star Wars: Galaxies, and the upcoming Stars Reach MMORPGs, gave a hour long presentation recently on the evolution of online video gaming. It's quite interesting, IMO.

Welcome to Paragon City and the Rogue Isles! 1. Very, although some archetypes/classes are more suitable for soloing than others. The most solo-friendly archetypes/classes are Brute, Mastermind, Scrapper, Sentinel, Stalker, and Tanker. Others are still soloable, just less so. No raid is necessary. 2. No. You can't change archetype/class, character origin, and primary and secondary power sets, but every ten levels you get a free respec so you can change every thing else. If you need additional respecs, you can buy them with in-game money. 2.5. There are meta builds, yes, but they only matter in advanced mode task/strike forces, which are only regularly ran by particular groups and are a niche activity. Otherwise, you can pretty much play what you'd like. 3. Type /altinvite character. No, there are no advantages to supergroups other than bases. 4. Hero side is pretty easy as it came first. Villain side is a little bit more difficult, but not significantly so. Gold side is a bit more difficult and is only recommended for people with some experience under their belt. Over all, leveling content is actually more difficult than your average modern MMOG, but endgame content is significantly easier than the average modern MMOG. There are raids, but they're optional, and most of them are pretty easy any more. You only get penalized for not try-harding on advanced mode task forces/strike forces, and that's a social penalty, not game mechanics.

That, and I've been seeing others tell people over the past year or so that if they don't want to min-max and speed run, they should leave Excelsior for Everlasting "because RPers don't mind playing with others that aren't min-maxed."

Half true, half not. After the final Rikti pylon is destroyed, you have ten minutes on the clock before the mothership raid ends. Planting the first bomb will extend the timer three minutes for a total of thirteen. If you have fewer than 25 people on a mothership raid league, planting the second bomb spawns U'Kon Gr'ai and adds an additional ten minutes onto the clock for a total of 23 minutes. If there are 25 or more people on a mothership raid league, planting a second bomb adds an additional three minutes for a total of sixteen minutes. If you have 25 or more people on a mothership raid league, planting a third bomb spawns U'Kon Gr'ai and adds an additional ten minutes onto the clock for a total of 26 minutes. Defeating U'Kon Grai adds an additional five minutes onto the clock for a total of either 28 minutes if you have fewer than 25 people on the mothership raid league, or a total of 31 minutes if you have 25 or more people on the mothership raid league.

Gravity Controller or Dominator with a large supply of Ultimate inspirations solves that problem. Just keep Wormholing Rikti from the ramps into the middle of the bowl.

It seems that I doomed the Xbox by buying a Series X console. Sorry about that. From a well known and accurate Xbox leaker, and confirmed by a second well known and accurate Xbox leaker: TL;DR: Microsoft has scrapped plans for a tenth generation Xbox video game console, and is ramping down production of Series S and Series X game consoles. They plan to transition entirely into a cloud based environment, like the Google Stadia of old.

Meanwhile, I managed to procure myself a Xbox Series X console last night, just before its price went up. Woo!

Good point. Wap them with the rolled up newspaper, and then spray them with water. That order is important. Don't want to get the newspaper all wet.

It is amazing how much misinformation about the game still spreads, all these years later. Bionic Flea is correct. And if someone tells you to turn off your stealth aura so the mobs can see you, wap them across the back of the head with a rolled up newspaper, and continue on rocking that stealth aura.

Personal opinion: I'd advise leveling normally and skipping the XP boosters for the first couple of characters, just so you get more exposure to the game and learn it. Unlike post-World of Warcraft MMOGs, City of Heroes is not an "endgame"-oriented MMOG thankfully. It's about the journey. Once you have a couple of characters under your belt and are more familiar with the game, then by all means use the XP boosters. Of course, the ultimate decision is yours, but that's my two cents.

At this point, I am half convinced that Microsoft wants out of the Xbox business. I decided last week to buy a Xbox Series X, but they're mostly out of stock with the exception of the $730 2 TB SSD version, and have been pulled entirely from.Costco and Target.

Just FYI, the Bluesky City of Heroes feed has been upgraded. It's now hosted on a newer, faster server, and can store up to the latest 10,000 Bluesky posts about City of Heroes and City of Villains. Posts should also be captured by the feed much more quickly. You can find the Bluesky City of Heroes feed here. To get your Bluesky post on the feed, use one or more of the following hashtags: #cityofheroes #cityofvillains #coh #cohhomecoming #cov #homecomingcoh Or use one of the following phrases: city of heroes city of villains paragon city paragon studios rogue isles Do note that any post that uses the #coh hashtag and/or #cov hashtag will have to be manually approved, so using one of the other hashtags would be preferable. Way too many people using #coh for Company of Heroes, and #cov for the Coventry soccer team.

If you want rubber banding to a minimum, play on a shard other than Excelsior. People have been complaining about massive lag and rubber banding on Excelsior on the City of Heroes sub-Reddit, and... the other shards have been fine. No lag whatsoever.

Welcome to Paragon City and the Rogue Isles! Auto-completing a mission is generally reserved for when there's a bug or issue with a mission and you can't complete the mission normally, which is there there is a three day cooldown. It's not meant for regular mission completion. Instead, the mission giver will give you some task to do, whether out in the world or in an instanced mission (dungeon). When you complete the mission, you'll be asked to return to the mission giver who will either give you a new mission, or introduce you to a new mission giver.

No one hates MMORPGs more than MMORPG sub-Reddit members. It's a bit of a meme at this point, but it is also true. $60 box price and a $15 per month subscription is AAA pricing, not indie. If it was a $30 box price and a $10 per month subscription like Embers Adrift (another indie MMORPG), there would have still been blowback, but not as bad. To top it off, the Heroic Games developers deleted posts and banned people for mild, legitimate criticisms of the game for months, before the price was announced. Some were indeed trolls deserving of bans. Maybe even most. But not all. Once the MMORPG sub-Reddit caught wind of the situation, it was game over. They didn't know of Ship of Heroes' indie situation, and that it was developed for several years. Most had never heard of the game before. They just saw blood, between the pricing, and the banning of people. They automatically assumed that the developers were "greedy" and that the game was a "scam." All in all, it was a combination of developers out of touch with modern gamers and the modern video game market, their being too defensive and seeing all criticism as just "haters" and "trolls," and a whole lot of jerks sensing blood that they could feed off of for entertainment. It's a danged shame.

As much as it pains me to say it, this may quite legitimately be the worst MMOG launch since Anarchy Online, 24 years ago. According to Kira, Heroic Games repeatedly asked MMORPG YouTubers to cover Ship of Heroes. Well, be careful what you wish for... I will continue playing it, but I don't know what can be done to salvage the game at this point.

As amusing as Consultant (the lead SoH developer), blaming Homecoming for orchestrating a review bombing of Ship of Heroes "out of fear" last night was, that's not at all what happened. It was mostly the MMORPG sub-Reddit. Some people like watching the world burn, and once drama over the game price (and then especially when Integral insinuated that the people complaining about the price were poor), reached the MMORPG sub-Reddit, a bunch of people there decided to pour gasoline on it and flood the Steam forums and wherever else they could out of amusement.

What are you talking about? If I join a speed TF, I speed. If I join a kill most TF, I kill most. But most of the time, I lead. TFs, SFs, raids, trials... You name it, and I've led it. I'm speaking from years of experience. During the base macro exploit era, when I led PUG teams, people assumed that I was a great big dumb dumb and must not know about the exploit because I refused to use it. They would use the base macro and get to missions sometimes minutes before I could, and almost finish it. Their time was more important than mine, even though I led. Now, if I lead a kill most PUG TF/SF that is level 45+, odds are good that one or two people on the team will decide that respecting their time is more important than my and others' fun and zoom off even though I clearly labeled the TF/SF/Trial as a kill most before starting. Again, they try to force convenience and speed on everyone else. That is before they get kicked, anyhoo. I used to lead Incarnate trials on Excelsior on occasion, years ago. Not naming names, but there were a couple of other Incarnate trial leaders who used to have friends on the league go and break maps, and teleport the league around the map with Incandescence Destiny every couple of minutes to speed run it. I stopped going to their trials because I didn't care for that. No big deal. But then a couple of people started demanding that I do the same thing with my Incarnate trials. Again, trying to force speed. That's when I left Excelsior and left Homecoming for over a year. If you make speed and convenience an option, eventually (sooner than later), players will try to shove it down everyone else's throats, like it or not. Team or league leader or not.

I was an OG player from 20 years ago. Nope, responsibilities were the same. I was in my late 20s when CoH started, and I had just started a new job. I still work today. Penelope Yin is one of my least favorite TFs because of how short it is. It's over before I know it, and I feel like I wasted my time and accomplished nothing as a result. Now, I don't want a Dr. Q TF either, but something in between is the sweet spot for me. It does not only apply to when I'm joining a team and not when I'm leading. I never used the base macro exploit when that was a thing, because I immediately recognized it for what it was: an exploit. Yet, within months, everyone and their mother used it, and started to assume that everyone else did as well. Nope. I knew about the base macro exploit and how to use it, but I don't knowingly use exploits. So even if I led a team and flew around to missions, others on the team all used the exploit to zip right to missions. Some would "helpfully" tell me how to use said exploit, thinking that I must not know about it. By the time I got to missions, people already had already partially cleared the mission sometimes because the rest used the base macro exploit. It got so bad that I just stopped PUGing until the base macro exploit was finally fixed. Again, lack of choice because most gamers will always go for the easy and shortest path.

Here's the thing with gamers in general. They talk about "choice." If there's a quick, easy road, and then a long road, gamers will 99.9% of the time pick the quick, easy road, but say that the long road is there for others who want to use it. But then they'll start trying to force everyone to use the quick and easy road "because it respects my time" or some other such nonsense, and soon, if you want to play with others, there's no choice at all. No thank you.

I have two Stalker alts on two separate accounts that are solely used to get my low damage characters (like Controllers), through their patron story arcs and stat-boosting accolades more quickly.

Heroic Games announced the pricing for Ship of Heroes. $60 for the base game, and a $15 per month subscription...

TFs and hero trials in rough order: Old Positron TF (Faultline hadn't been revamped yet) Synapse TF Calvin Scott TF Citadel TF Manticore TF Numina TF Dr. Quaterfield TF Sara Moore TF Justin Augustine TF Faathim the Kind TF Cavern of Transcendence Trial Terra Volta #1 Trial Terra Volta #2 Trial Eden Trial Terra Volta #3 Trial Moonfire TF Ernesto Hess TF Sister Psyche TF Katie Hannon TF Ms. Liberty TF Lady Grey TF Abandoned Sewers Trial Imperious TF Dr. Kahn TF Positron 1 TF Positron 2 TF Apex TF Tin Mage TF Admiral Sutter TF Death from Below Trial Drowning in Blood Trial Penelope Yin TF Market Crash Trial SFs and villain trials in rough order: Virgil Tarikoss SF Silver Mantis SF Operative Renault SF Ice Mistral SF Treespec #1 Trial Treespec #2 Trial Treespec #3 Trial Classic Lord Recluse SF Lady Grey TF Imperious TF Barracuda SF Lord Recluse SF Apex TF Tin Mage TF Mortimer Kal SF Death from Below Trial Drowning in Blood Trial Market Crash Trial Dr. Aeon SF Somewhere in there is the Cathedral of Pain Trial. The Cathedral of Pain Trial was added to the game, yoinked, and then added back in years later. When it takes place chronologically, your guess is as good as mine.

This is exactly what I do on every character. Although I made the mistake of doing the original Tina MacIntyre "The Praetorian War" story arc just for a change of pace once. Once.

Did you already do the Dark Watcher story arc? If so, that removes Aaron Walker from the game. You'll need to contact a GM.